Adapting Santiago Method to Determine Appropriate and Resource Efficient Sanitation Systems for an Urban Settlement in Lima Peru

Abstract

The pre-selection of locally appropriate sanitation technologies and systems is crucial for strategic sanitation planning as any decision is only as good as the options presented. One approach that allows us to systematically consider the local conditions and a diverse range of conventional and novel technologies and systems is the Santiago method. In this paper, we discuss whether the Santiago method can be applied to the case of Latin America and what we would gain from this application. We do so by expanding the Santiago technology library with technologies that have been shown to be promising in metropolitan areas of Latin America, such as condominial sewer, container-based sanitation, and activated sludge. We then apply Santiago to the semi-informal settlement Quebrada Verde (QV) in Lima, Peru. Using Santiago, we were able to generate 265,185 sanitation system options from 42 technologies and 18 appropriateness criteria. A set of 17 appropriate and divers are then selected. The diversity is defined by 17 system templates. To further evaluate these 17 systems, resource recovery and loss potentials are quantified. Higher nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus) and total solids recovery are observed for systems that combine urine diversion and biofuel production. The case of QV shows that the Santiago method is applicable in the Latin American context.

Resource-oriented sanitation: Identifying appropriate technologies and environmental gains by coupling Santiago software and life cycle assessment in a Brazilian case study

“…SANitation system Alternative GeneratOr (Santiago) is a free software capable of generating system options for urban planning based on a set of criteria. The approach has been tested in different locations, such as the cities of Arba Minch (Ethiopia), Lima (Peru), and Katarniya (Nepal), where it has been found to be systematic and reproducible (Nisaa et al, 2021;Spuhler et al, 2018Spuhler et al, , 2021. The cases showed it to be capable of providing substantial benefits, as it opens up the decision space with novel and potentially more appropriate solutions.…”